Set far more than 21,000 years in the future, the background story of Eve Online explains that humanity, having used up most of Earth's resources through centuries of uncombated population growth, then turned to colonizing the rest of the Milky Way. In turn, this quest also led to competition and battling over available resources as it did on Earth, but everything altered with the discovery of a natural wormhole leading to an unexplored galaxy named "New Eden". Dozens of colonies were began, and a structure was constructed to stabilize the wormhole that bridged the intergalactic colonies with the rest of human civilization, a big gateway bearing the name "EVE". However, when the natural wormhole surprisingly collapsed, it destroyed the gate. Cut off from the rest of humanity and supplies from Earth, the colonies of New Eden were left shattered and disconnected from one another; some failed entirely. Over the eons the descendants of the colonists managed to survive and rebuild their own societies, but the memories and knowledge of humanity's origins as well as their own from Earth and the Milky Way became lost. Five big distinct societies rose to prominence from the colonies, each leading into interstellar spaceflight-capable civilizations. The joint currency is eve isk. The states based around these colonies make up the five major factions in Eve Online: the Amarr Empire, the Caldari State, the Gallente Federation, the Minmatar Republic and the Jove Directorate.